Lonely like the wolf

Some free photo off the intwebs

I can’t tell you the first time I howled. I was probably around 14 or 15 years old. I walked to the nearby park. It was not a full moon, I remember it was more of a crescent on that lovely summer night.

I was lonely. Like, proper, sandpaper-scratching-my-heart lonely. I might have been crying. I didn’t want to be at home, and I also didn’t want to explain to my parents that I tried calling the few friends I had but no one was available for me to talk to or be with me. I had tried to bury my loneliness in reading, since books were my reliable and steady companions since I was three years old — but that day they failed me. The words refused to stay still, so I read them again and again but they made no sense. The TV had nothing new on. I felt bored, restless, longing for something I could not name, but most of all, what I felt was overwhelmingly lonely.

This was a new feeling to me. I am an only child, and as such, I was used to entertaining myself. I was used to being by myself and normally I did not have any trouble nor qualms with that. Back in those teen years, I did not have many friends (still do not) nor did I need many. The company of a group of others was not something I searched for often. Yet here I was, so lonely. I was in a park, between some trees, looking up at that night sky, and howling.

I tried to do it correctly, too. I went for the sound at the back of my throat, at the top where the growl meets the tongue. This is not the place where words we speak are formed. This is the place of basic sound, of growls and yips and yelps. A place of most primitive noise. I wanted to imitate not a dog, but its ancient ancestor, the wolf. I wanted to express a feeling of loneliness and frustration, but I was simply a human.

I came close to matching that wolf sound. I always come close to that wolf sound when I howl. I believe I am a very good howler, but then, I am not critical of myself when it comes to that. That night was the first time I howled my loneliness and my pain.

I’m pretty sure I might have scared some of the neighbors. For that, I am sorry to this day. I didn’t howl for more than a minutes or so. It felt so good. It felt freeing and powerful and releasing.

I have always loved wolves. This was probably because they look like dogs and dogs have been and still are, my true obsession. When I learned about wolves’ family structure, about their pack, their hierarchy within the pack, how they hunt, how they think, how they raise their young, it did nothing to diminish my love for the animals.

Of course, the way the wolf howls is completely different. One wolf can make itself sound like several — this is an adaptation device both against predators as well as make the pray think they are surrounded and confuse them. And it is a communication, as the sound carries across miles. Remarkable animals who hunt at twilight, they can run for days. They are also pragmatic and pick their fights, choosing violence only as a last resort.

I have been howling for almost 50 years now. In open parks, in my own bathroom (for the acoustics) when no one was home, in the mountains on the trails, into my pillow, at nights on full moons and at nights with no moons. Some people scream to release their intense emotions — I howl. It is the wild side in me. Thinking about it, it is my only wild side. I am a very tame, domesticated housefrau.

It has been many years since I have felt that lonely. Partially because I have built a wonderful community/pack around myself, and partially because I have learned to deal with loneliness with many different techniques (of course reading, and now also drawing, journaling, and watching a helluva lot of mysteries from many different countries). But from time to time, I become a wild woman who still has a need to howl, and I honor that woman by releasing my mighty howl into the universe.